Target Doesn’t Destroy Small Towns
My parents live in the lake country of Northern Minnesota. It’s beautiful; please visit sometime. They live near Park Rapids (pop 3,300) and Wadena (pop 4,200), two quaint small towns about 30 miles apart. Wal-Mart is building a box store in each town. These cities have vibrant downtowns with ice cream confectionaries, candy shops, coffee shops, theaters, dime stores, bookstores, restaurants, and hardware stores. We know what happens when a box store opens on the edge of town, the downtown dies. Economists say that the little shops in town are economic dinosaurs. Maybe the economists are right, but I will still grieve the loss of these special places.

Target doesn’t build stores in towns with populations of 4,200 or 3,300 and it isn’t on their agenda (as far as I know).

Employees (An Anecdote)Sunday Sep 10th 10:00 AM
Wal-Mart: I smiled at the people greeter. She didn’t greet me or anyone else. She stood there like a zombie looking straight ahead scowling.

After spending 15 minutes looking for a lunch box, I asked an employee where the lunch boxes were. She led us aimlessly around the store with no idea where they were. Eventually she asked another employee working at the jewelry counter, “Hey ya know where the lunch boxes are?”

She looked up from the phone, chewing her gum, said “Nope”, and returned to her telephone.

We didn’t find a lunch box.

As I left, I saw 25 checkout lanes. Two were open. The lines were 15 deep. After 60 minutes, I walked out empty handed and nauseous.

Sunday Sep 10th 11:15 AM
Target: The people greeter smiled and asked, “Can I help you?”

“Where are the lunch boxes?” I asked.

She whispered something into a microphone on her chest, paused, and said, “Behind aisle 8 against the back wall.”

Target had ten lanes open and two with no line. In less than ten minutes, I found what I wanted and left with a smile on my face.

I don’t know if Target offers higher pay or better benefits but I can tell that they attract different employees; employees that care. Wal-Mart employees appear indifferent.

Happy Customers
At the Target store near my home, I see energetic customers smiling, visiting, and laughing.

At Wal-Mart I see people moping around with frowns, yelling at their kids, and everyone looks depressed.

Cleanliness
In my experience, the difference in cleanliness between the two chains is dramatic, especially the bathrooms. I brought my son into the bathroom at Wal-Mart and it was so nasty I’ll never bring him there again.

433 Responses

Steve, I found your blog last week and I’ve been enjoying reading it since. I think we’re both in a similar place, reassessing what our lives and the world are really all about and why we do the things we do. On this post, however, you’re starting to lose me. Don’t get me wrong, I hate Wal-mart for numerous reasons and shopping at Target is certainly much more fun. I just think you’re damaging your credibility by your narrow observations, based on a very tiny sample of stores and stereotypes.

Your comment about the NASCAR-shirted, pink-slippered clientele is a really narrow-minded, unthinking generalization. Instead of these knee-jerk statements that show very little critical thinking, why don’t you consider the possible reasons behind the differences between the two companies’ approaches.

Better yet, why not consider why we need to go to either of these places “frequently”? They are both still giant corporations (the idea that Target doesn’t put small stores out of business is naive) that sell a lot of crap that no one needs (Target just does a better job of making it look pretty), a good portion of which is probably made in sweatshoppish conditions somewhere. In our search for enlightenment, maybe the next step should be too think about why we so blindly follow such a consumerist lifestyle.

About stereotypes, you’re right, it is narrow, I thought that was obvious. But much humor is about stereotypes. Dilberts boss, Dilbert, the soup nazi, south park, etc, all of which I find funny. That’s all. It seems it’s awfully hard to do anything funny without offending someone.

I’m from Minnesota and I loved the movie Fargo but many people here were offended by the stereotypical Minnesotans in the movie. I thought they were funny.

One thing I want to do with my personal development is to stop taking myself so seriously all the time and laugh a little at the stuff around me.

To each is own I guess.

Thanks for reading. I’ll do more on my personal developement again soon.

I just wanted to share that Wal-Mart depresses me, Target doesn’t, and do it in a funny way.

I’m totally with you on the Target thing. We live in a more metropolitan area, so we have more Targets near by. We need to drive to the hinterlands to go to Wal-Marts, and given that we’re a gay family, it’s just one more reason not to set foot inside.

The few times we have gone in, I could check off about 6 of your complaints on my list. I’m not sure how you’re narrow minded by observing that some bathrooms are cleaner than others, the customer service or the parking lot issues, but frankly, I view those as pretty OBJECTIVE things and not subjective.

Jen said “I just think you’re damaging your credibility by your narrow observations, based on a very tiny sample of stores and stereotypes.[snip] …They are both still giant corporations…a good portion of which is probably made in sweatshoppish conditions somewhere”.

Way to backup your statement that the author damaged his credibility by narrow observations and stereotypes by presenting your own narrow observations and stereotypes.

This is too true! I went to my local Wal-Mart a few times when it first opened- even then it smelled like failure and rancid popcorn. I stopped going because it was so depressing, and I stayed away when I learned more about them. No reason to shop there!

It took me awhile to discover Target – I thought they were more like K-Mart. I was wrong. I love going there! I almost always find what I need and the employees are glad to help. The stores are clean and the merchadise is of good quality. And yes, they do pay their employees better and they get benefits. Plus they have Isaac Mizrahi clothes, how great is that?

It’s the same as the difference between the Wal-Mart offshoot Sam’s Club and Costco. Costco is SO much better, and they offer excellant wages, benefits, and a chance to advance. The owners have quite a progressive view of how to manage their enterprise. You already know how Wal-Mart does it. Again, no reason to shop at Sam’s Club – if there is a Costco near you, go there instead, you will not be sorry.

You my friend are spot on about Wal-Mart and Target. Nice to know they’re the same here in Washington State.There are two trannys that work at the Federal way store, just to give you an idea of the people in that store. It’s a freak show everytime you go.If your in the area stop in the Federal Way store and say hi to Xhoundra,shes the man in a dress with a beard.

I swear it’s getting you can’t go anywhere without seing an 8 or a 3 on someones shirt. Immediately you know what kind of place you are in. Not all are bad or obnoxious like ….ah………wait ……. ah, well, I’m sure there are good ones……………somewhere….. But then I live in Oklahoma.

I’m not sure why RV camping in a Wal-Mart parking lot would be unsafe. It’s nice to know you have someplace in any decent sized town to pull over for the night and not get hassled by cops. Wal-Mart parking lots are often patrolled or videotaped which makes for a much safer camping spot than the side of the road, certianly.

Walmart allows people to “camp”? Hardly. Well, if you want to call a motorcoach “camping”, maybe. That comment was a stretch, and it gives me pause to wonder how much else of your piece was more rhetoric than fact. The bottom line is that Walmart survives because people shop there; even you.

Jen, his comment about the “NASCAR-shirted, pink-slippered clientele” is not narrowminded and unthinking. It’s an accurate image that falls right in the middle of the typical WalMart customer aesthetic range. Having been to several examples of each store, i can say that what he says is very true. Of course not all the shoppers there are like that. But i’d say his description just about hits the nail on the head as far as finding the mean average of physical appearance.

Maybe in some places in the world, there are WalMarts full of people who don’t look like somebody peed in their gene pool. But all the ones i’ve been to have been very scary indeed. I almost wanted to wear vinyl gloves and a gas mask. Have you ever seen the film “Gummo”??

Most WalMart shoppers look like they were rejected as wannabe extras for a John Waters flick for being too defective….It’s true…

I haven’t gone checking my sources, so forgive me if I assume something that is otherwise stated in the links.

1) Perhaps Wal-Mart has many more police calls because they have more traffic than Target? Or even a stricter policy for the manager’s when they have to call the police.
2) I doubt you can prove that Target has never had a customer walk in with “NASCAR Shirt, Purple Sweat Pants, and Pink Fluffy Slippers at Target”. Meanwhile, I can say that I’ve never seen “NASCAR Shirt, Purple Sweat Pants, and Pink Fluffy Slippers at Target” at Wal-Mart.
3) Same for employees. Your experience at less than a handful of stores does not make it the truth.
4) See above.
5) Please show me a study stating that a Target-style parking lots are any safer than a Wal-Mart style parking lot.
6) Many stores have a policy that you’re not allowed to take pictures, videos, or audio recordings without their consent.
7) I don’t know why you consider Wal-Mart to be “disorganized”, but from what I’ve seen, the auto parts are in the auto section, the toys are in the toys section, the electronics are in the electronics section, and so on.
etc. etc.

There are too many holes in your arguments to take what you say seriously, or even with a very large grain of salt.

While I generally agree with your points, I find that I have to shop at Wal-Mart. The Target (3 minutes from my house) NEVER has what I need in stock – even common items like soap and paper towels. Wal-Mart always has it in stock, but I have to navigate my cart around boxes in the aisle and mothers changing their children’s diapers in the middle of the store (I see it about twice a month).

As soon as the managers at Target learn how to control inventory (and yes, I’ve told them about it numerous times), I’ll be a loyal customer.

Steve – I think Jen is one of those people who takes life just a little too seriously. And to be honest, you nailed it on the head. I hate WalMart. First and foremost because that place just drains the f***ing life out of me.

But it does serve one purpose – if it closed, all those people would go to Target and then it would suck as bad as WalMart.

I think your blog kicked ass.
Walmart sucks. Bottom line. There is no soul in the Walmart organization. They don’t care what they do, who they destroy, what nbeighborhoods they kill and what cultures they poison for the sake of the almighty dollar.
I live in Dallas Texas. There are dozens of Walmarts in this city any they are each placed within one to two miles of one another. Why??? Because they want to make a buck. Is that bad? When its on the backs of the working man who is underpaid by Walmart and thereby taxing the health care industry in the cities they are in – YES!
I’d rather drive to target where the isles are wider, the people are nicer, and the atmosphere doesnt just suck.

Wal-Mart is gross and disgusting. The first one I ever set foot in in Sun Prairie Wis. was filthy. My opinion has not changed. My ex-wife insists that she needs to shop there because of the prices; the weird thing is she loves Target. I keep trying to pound it into her head that Wal-Mart is evil and is trying to take over the world. I really don’t think that I’m a nut-job-left-wing-bomb-thrower, but Wal-Mart is an evil EVIL place. I just don’t feel that way about Target.

I totally agree with your experiences with the two stores. I really dont know why it is, but target just seems to have a better class of customers. A little while ago I was in a walmart and a man with 4 children with him came up behind me (in their very narrow isles) and proceded to make loud beeping noises…. WTF? Of course this is a broad generalization to say that all their customers are rude morons, but it does seem that way.

Actually angled parking spaces are easier and safer to use with much lower likelihood of collisions. By using square spaces, Target is the one sacrificing ease of use for the sake of squeezing in a couple of extra spaces on each row.

I live in southern Maine and the mental pictures painted of Wally-world are DEAD ON. When I go to Target, its bright, organized, bustling and positive. I can always find something either by looking or asking. (and they know where things are!!) When going to the local yuk-mart, its as if your words were literally translated into reality by STNG’s holodeck. Isles of crap piled up to the sky, listless employees, idiotic greeters with 75 or lower IQ, people looking like their on the edge of total dispair, it just goes on and on. The one reason I must go to crap-mart is the Shell Rotella syntheic oil there for cheap that Target regrettably doesnt carry. Target’s parking lot is a little convoluted but navigable and CLEAN. Carts are rounded up and hauled with the help of a robo-assist cart driver to help the employees. Nicely done.

You are dead on, my friend. Walmart is evil. I cannot tell you the number of times people have practically run me down in the aisles of Walmart (before we got a Target here) and it seems to be the local weekend hangout for a lot of people. I detest going, and get anxious inside the store because people will just run into others with carts and then look at them in a hateful way. We were used to Target before coming here, and the difference is HUGE. Now that Target is in town I have to say our lives have vastly improved. I love Target! Walmart sucks….but I will say at least they have Sams which seems to still be a tolerable branch of the franchise.

[…] Some upstanding gentleman has written a thing about why Target is better then Wal-Mart, being in australia this really has 0 relevence to my everyday life (hahaha) and whatnot, but Target has been good to me over the years and this is couple of cents worth of +karma. […]

Sadly enough, we actualy have ten Wal-Marts here. If they didn’t get new toys in in such a timely manner more than most places tend to, odds are they’d get a lot less of my business across the board. And while you made it humor, I HAVE seen numerous people in Wal-Mart at all times of day, in more than one state, across over 20 stores wearing pajamas and/or slippers. It’s sad. There’s a reason they’re called SLEEPWEAR, people.

You might be interested to know that the lack of cashiers is not entirely due to lack of employees. In fact, Wal-Mart’s scheduling is done entirely by a computer system in Arkansas, which somehow fails to explain the lack of cashiers on Friday nights and Saturdays – the most important times to have a lot of them. The managers actually hate the scheduling too, but have little sway in changing it.

Steve,
You’re totally right about everything. I have a cabin between Lake George and Park Rapids, and it KILLS me to think of what Wal-Mart is going to do to Park Rapids. Places like Park Rapids, Wadena, and Walker have so many great local businesses, it is a shame to know that a lot of them are in serious jeopardy now that the evil empire is coming to town. I also disagree with Jen about your supposed “narrow minded, unthinking generalizations.” There really is a HUGE difference between the stores and their general clientele, and you hit the nail on the head with it. And though they’re both big-box companies, at least Target has a a sense of ethics, whereas Wal-Mart has a cutthroat business strategy that they somehow are able to masquerade as ethics. I’ve spent half my life in the Park Rapids area, and it just blows me away that they would allow something like Wal-Mart to invade such a cool little community, given the easily accessible and widely-known facts about their business practice. Their city council should be run out of town. There is no way they could be able to pull the “how could we have known this would happen” card if/when the town’s mainstreet shops close their doors one-by-one.

I totally agree with you. I live in California, where there are very few Wal-Marts and a lot of Targets. I went to one of the local Wal-Marts once and vowed never to return. The aisles were narrow, nothing was in their correct place (do they even have employees that reorganize stuff on the shelves? It didn’t look like it.) and it was just… dirty. Can’t really explain it, just a feeling I got of not being clean.

If I had my druthers, I would never set foot in, or downwind of a Walmart – (or a Kmart, for that matter, and for the same reasons). I’m just not interested in purchasing items that 1) have already been torn open or picked thru, or 2) have food stains on them. Call me picky.

Frankly, the Walmart closest to my home – which is not really all that close – is only a year old, but it is already dirty, crowded, and slovenly. I go to Walmart to buy one thing, and one thing only – whiffle balls for baseball practice.

Target, if you will carry a bigger selection of whiffle balls, you will be doing me a tremendous favor.

I regularly go to 2 different Walmarts. One at home and one at school. The one at home is exactly how you described it, but the one up at school is probably one of the best department stores I’ve ever been to. They are always organized and clean, other than when they restock the shelves (it’s a 24-hour store), and the parking lots are fine, other than the idiot drivers from Mass (no offense Mass people). I think Walmart’s prices are a lot better than Target, and I know where everything is. In Target, the prices are higher and it’s hard to find anything unless you know EXACTLY where it is. Even though Target is closer to my school, I prefer to go to Walmart just because it’s better than Target.
Again, don’t get me wrong, some Walmarts are how you described, but not all of them.

I have to say, this is absolutely, one-hundred-percent correct. Really, though, you’re using topical observations to get at the heart of a larger issue; wal-mart is simply crushing every town and city it enters.

Unfortunately, American capitalism is all about corporate profit, and not at all about -real- corporate responsibility. I’m glad to say we have a Target in my town, and I go there regularly, but until Mr. And Mrs. Clueless American also refuse to patronize Wal-Mart, nothing will change.

I frankly loved your blog – kudos! Now as for the impending flame-war, let me put in my two cents. I like Target better than Walmart too, but I shop at Walmart because it’s signiicantly closer than Target (35 miles closer!). Neither one of them is the picture of corporate responsibility, but you shop where you can afford to get what you need.

But the same argument could be made between Home Depot and Lowe’s or Best Buy and Circuit City.

Now as for the remarks about Nascar, etc. Look, I saw the post as funny and I’m wearing a Nascar shirt right now (#48). Adrian’s comments are just juvinile. Frankly, Nascar, like football, or baseball, or soccer is just entertainment for the masses (think Collusium in Rome). What if I said all soccer fans should die in a fire and should have to pay $400 a pair for their shoes? How is that any different.

Right on. I’ve always hate the monster. I spent 20 extra bucks on a toy just so I wouldn’t by it at wal-mart. I prefer Target even though I have to drive 30 minutes just to get to one. Wal-mart destroys small towns.

I must agree with this article 100%. This includes the statement regarding the apparel choices of most Wal-Mart customers.
I like to think I live in a upscale neighborhood in Eugene, Oregon.
My last visit to my local Wal-Mart located on Green Acres Rd. We encountered a stripper fight in the parking lot right in front of the store. These two women were fighting over thier “man” with a Wal-Mart manager trying to intervene. They were even wearing the stripper shoes. I thought it was some sort of protest or performance art. But alas, it was a honest to gawd stripper fight. Needless to say, we will never return to that Wal-Mart again.

Note: The only thing to purchase at Wal-Mart is the first release DVD’s. They sell these at a loss to entice customers. I buy them just to stick it to Wal-Mart

but I do hate walmart. The thing about building in small towns is terrible and capitalistic. I agree with the guy above me, I wish that there was a way to inform mr&mrs. clueless america of bad stores and companies…such as coca cola, for anyone reading this.

I have some friends who love Target and everything about Target. They will literally spend hours at some random Target because Target rocks. Would they step foot in a Walmart? Ha, I doubt it and it’s pretty obvious why. Walmart seriously has no soul. The aisles in Target are wide and clean not to mention sparkly. Walmart’s are more akin a soul sucking vortex of unpleastness littered with random discarded items from uncontrolled children, abandoned shopping carts of unfortunate human beings who as far as we know, are hidden somewhere in the clutter after their last breaths had expired and lifeless zombies of employees. Make your rebuttals as you may, but I do know that the customer bases of both chains reflect these fundamental differences. Shoppers at Walmart glare and sniffle, look gray and palid and rarely offer a smile. Their lifelessness is so evident that sometimes, I swear, I could be at a graveyard. At least odor-wise, there’s not much of a difference. Target customers on the other hand, well you only have to look at my friends who would probably place Target among the wonders of the world, right next to the Taj Mahal and the pyramids, to see the difference. Target customers have a spring to their step as they wander from aisle to aisle, smiles plastered on their faces so wide you would wonder why the top half of their head doesn’t fall off. And that alone is the most important difference.

I am working on my MBA and a fellow student, a WalMart mgr, told me that WalMart’s plan in my community is to have one WalMart ever 7.5 miles.

And finally…the one good positive about WalMart…when it’s xmas 2am and I forgot that last minute gift, I’ll have no choice but to hit WalMart because Target is closed and the store lower on the rung than WalMart, KMart, is no longer in my community…and I couldn’t be happier.

Having stepped into a walmart that was built close to me in the last year, I can say they have made improvements in the layout and look of the store. I still prefer Target. Although they both have most products made in china (and who doesn’t now a days), Targets products seem to be more stylish and of a higher quality than walmart.

Your assessment is 100% accurate. We live less than a mile from a Wal-Mart. We go there once every few months and then only because their prices for cereal is better than anywhere else. My wife claims she gets “shopping rage” while in the store for exactly the reasons you list.
One thing you forgot to mention is the self-checkout machines in Wal-Mart. They introduced these mainly to circumvent the staffing issues you mentioned. The problem is multi-fold: a) customers are too stupid to use them properly, b) no customer ever gets through the line without needing help at least once from the overworked and far too slow supervising cashier, and c) they are as temrinally dirty as the rest of the store.
Wal-Mart sux, Target rox…

I couldn’t agree more with your ten reasons why Target is better than Wal-Mart. I’ve never been to a Wal-Mart where I didn’t leave feeling not only ill, but positively homicidal. Something about those stores just screws with your mind.

I’m glad Wal-Mart allows people to camp in their lots. Really, I am. Everyone needs sleep and God knows the average truck driver can’t find a lot of room for his semi and his trailers nowadays.

Otherwise, both Target and Wal-Mart could burn in millions of fires tomorrow and I wouldn’t care. I’d shop at smaller stores that charge a couple or twenty dollars more, but I’d feel a hell of a lot better about that than giving my money to a board of executives who don’t care about screwing us, China, or anyone else in the world.

I had to laugh out loud at your description of the occasional clientele of wal-mart. I totally agree. Let me give you a sample of my experience. Have you ever had to be detained in the parking lot behind a lumbering plus-size family — with a mean weight of 400 pounds — walking down the center of the lane? At least four times here. Shame on me for shopping there. Gads, but I can’t help but feel I’m helping pay the slave wages of the millions of Chinese that create the lion’s share of products that Wal-Mart provides. Again, shame on me. I will seriously consider shopping at Target now. Thanks for the humorous yet real article.

To all of you that are emitting your politically correct outrage: stow it. He told it like it is.

Side note: I haven’t had the experience with disgruntled personnel that you have; most of the people at the Wal-Marts in Des Moines are just fine; friendly, helpful, etc. However, the description of “25 lanes…only two open” really fits the bill, especially at night. I remember waiting in a Wal-Mart checkout line around the Christmas season about two years ago. There was a sign that said something like “20 minutes max wait time to check out” or something like that. I had been in the line 45 minutes before I got to the point where I could read the sign, and was only halfway through at that point.

I discovered something out when they “upgraded” the wal-mart where I used to live that you may find interesting. When they first open a new store (or store section) prices are VERY cheap, like a good $2 or more under everywhere else. Over the course of about 6 months or so the prices slowly go up as not to spook customers. Before you know it the prices are maybe MAYBE $.02 under compeditors. They use their supposed “low prices” to hook people in, and of course most of the people that shop there are entirely too oblivious to notice that the prices are going up at all so they continue to shop there. Pretty sneaky and underhanded if you ask me.

I may be living in a twilight zone in my adoptive town of Apopka Fllorida, but our Super Walmart is clean, well stocked , wide ailed, and staffed by knowledgeable clerks. The prices there are, for the most part, irresistable. Why should I pay more for something in one store if another store down the road offers it at a lower price? The supermarkets and box stores in my area are so close together that gas consumption is not an issue, but prices are. I consider shopping, as everyone should, a challenge to be mastered. The pie can be sliced so as to allow everyone to get their fair share. My shopping habits take me not only to Walmart, but to Winn Dixie, Publix, Target, Lowe’s, Home Depot, Sears, CVS, Walgreens, PetsMart and online services as well. Oops, cant forget the occasional foray to The Bombay Company.

While I may bemoan the loss of our town’s Food Lion Store 2 years ago, and the near loss of the Winn Dixie chain, driven to near bankruptcy, which I can only attribute to the shadow of Sam Walton, the American way of doing business must go on. Gee, how many of you remember Woolworth’s or SS Kresge’s or Piggly Wiggly ?

Again, while Sam Walton’s dream may be someone else’s nightmare, sheer common sense and logical thinking should be everyone’s weapons. No, I dont spend 100 hours a week shopping, and I dont own any Nascar shirts, but I do plan ahead, and make my lists according to where I will be on a given day. And if I happen to be in our Super Walmart late in the day, on Wednesday’s I think,, I may see the lady in the fuzzy pink slippers. I will be the guy juggling three shopping lists, a calculator, and wearing a Nascar baseball cap. Happy shopping to all and to all a good night.

Of the two, there is no comparison. Target is by far the better store. The only, and I mean only, thing that Wally World has going for it is that it is open at 1 am when I get out of work. Even still I try to plan ahead and avoid the need when I can.
Truthfully, I try to avoid ALL big box style chain stores and shop at locally owned shops whenever possible.
Support local commerce!

The BEST walmart I’ve been to was in MEXICO! In Acapulco. Had never been to one, went there and it was clean, organized, very wide aisles, well lit, and a good experience. I thought, “Gee, WalMart isn’t that bad afterall.” When I got back to California and went shopping at one in Aliso Viejo, I was so surprised to find it crowded, dirty (people had written words in the furniture, TV cabinets, etc., they were so dusty) and in general, just a bad store. WHY wold Mexico have a better store than the USA? That’s weird. As above, I like Costco, Target, etc., and don’t go to WalMart. Oh yeah, on a visit to Palm Springs, the WalMart was evacuated because the greeter saw a blinking light in the trash can. Hours later, the police found it was a WalMart security device that was blinking.

I’m glad you wrote this. There have been similar studies done between Lowes and Home Depot, which have indicated that Lowes attracts more female consumers because of the layout of their stores, the way they price, and the atmosphere/ambiance of their store. Home Depot on the other hand tends to attract male consumers, because of the advice available from their employees about “do it yourself projects” (note – no comments about quality here), and because the atmosphere/ambiance tends to be more ‘construction’ focused.

The point is that Wal-Mart caters to certain types of consumers based on how they lay out their stores, pricing, and service versus how Target does. Insert observations about NASCAR jackets and pink slippers here. I’ve never seen a 400 pound woman dragging 2 toddlers and pushing an infant around in a shopping cart at 2am in a Target bitching because they don’t have something for her double-wide… I have seen one EVERY time I’ve EVER gone into a Wal-Mart.

(BTW – Has anyone else noticed that nearly all of the responses here in FAVOR of Wal-Mart have spelling or grammatical errors? Coincidence – I think not!)

Hey I loved your comparision. i actually used to work at Target and i can tell you that as employees we were told to think of the customers as ‘Guests’ not customers because that would make sure we treated them in a way, in which, we expected them and wanted them to come back. Also the employees are not in ‘departments’ we are Teams, to encourage unity among the staff. Great Blog. As a former insider, I completely agree with you.
P.S. I’m a college student and have been known to wear my pyjama pants out, just because I’m too lazy/tired/sick to get dressed. As my Aunt says, why do I care what people think of me, when I am never going to see them again. However, that is just my personal opinion and I would never wear my slippers out, which ARE pink and fuzzy, by the way.

Your comparison of Target vs. Walmart is DEAD ON. I can’t tell you how many conversations I’ve had with others that cited almost everything you’ve mentioned. People would come into my home and comment on some nice piece of furniture or fixture, asking where I got it — and it was always the same answer: Target. They treat me like a human there as well — and there aren’t nearly so many meth addicts in the pharmaceutical section as Walmart. The attitude of employees, the design of the stores, the quality of the products — it all blows Walmart out of the water. Walmart is working to circumvent local laws in so many communities in order to build even bigger stores than it already has (like in Henderson, Kentucky). Walmart also has workshops for their employees to learn about federal welfare programs they can pursue for healthcare, since Walmart can’t be bothered providing such (they’d prefer to have the taxpayers pay for it). You forgot their misleading “Made in America” branding — what a LIE!! This blog posting made my day.

This blog is right on every point. My family is a Wal-Mart family, not because we like it, but because there are very few alternatives in our area. I’m glad to hear I’m not the only person who gets depressed when they walk into a Wal-Mart. As I always put it, it’s like stepping into the seventh circle of hell: People who should never be parents yelling at their delinquent kids, people too fat to walk scuttling along on their motorized wheelchairs, and no one in the place seems to have gotten past the fifth grade. And the merchandise is not much better than the clientel.

I do get the opportunity to visit a Target every once in a while, though, and it’s always the exact inverse of everything Wal-Mart is. The people seem happier and not so trashy, it’s not as crowded, and the merchandise is of much higher quality.

The clothes, for example: The only clothes I would ever buy at Wal-Mart are undershirts and boxers, but I’ve bought many a good pair of pants at Target. Have you ever noticed that Wal-Mart’s clothes are about 2-3 years out of fashion and even then are a terrible imitation of that fashion? I really don’t give a crap about fashion myself, but even I know that a single piece of fabric sewn to the side of a pair of kahkis does not constitute “cargo pants.”

Wal-Mart allows people to park their vehicles in the their parking lot and sleep in them. Unlike many cities around the country. It’s a form of discrimination against homless that is prevailent in America today. If you don’t have a home you must be a criminal and dangerous.

Why you would assume that this is unsafe I don’t know. It’s pretty bigoted. I have at many times taken this opportunity to do this because I have traveled extensively in a vehicle and could not afford a hotel room. I was appreciative that there was a safe, lighted place to park and sleep. Travelers are a community of people that generally watch out for each other and the places they use to park. The unsafe people usually have homes they go back to after they’ve done their dastardly deed.

Not all travelers are upstanding. Not all people ingrained into the community are upstanding. Not all police or elected officials are upstanding. Like I said I’ve found the traveler community to be closer nit than even people who live on the same street in a community. I want the place I park to be safe and take steps to ensure it. Don’t continue to spread the false notion that travelers are unsafe or dangerous people.

I must say that your thoughts are shared with the majority of people who have visited a wal-mart between the hours of 6:00pm – 5:59PM the following day. However, I also have to agree with a statement made above about Target being out of stock on the majority of commonly used items.

Thus being said, there is one thing that most of us fail to see and Steve points out. It’s a GIANT company with GIANT profits and a GIANT customer database. This means they can cut corners on the small daily conveniences such as parking, a friendly face, or even some level of cleanliness and that is to Roll Back Prices! yuk yuk… Wal-mart offers lower-budgeted family the option of buying some items in bulk (and shot guns for the “social” outings) as well as having everything in one trip. Same with Target.

The problem lies on the people who RELY on these stores as being the “only” place to shop. We are a product of our own design… which is convenience. I am all for technology and convenience, but at the same time I get tired of having every GIANT company forcing themselves on everyone in every community. What can you do? We as consumers have given in to the idea of *-mart chains and Wal-mart just happened to boom first.

The general type of people you find in a wal-mart is not limited to the NASCAR t-shirt Purple-on-pink style (I don’t have mine yet because Target didn’t have any in stock) but also spans in to my genre of style which is everyone closes the damn doors at 8:00pm and I happen to thrive at night (graves at a NOC), which limits my shopping to whatever is open. I have typically see the portrayed image around that time (and pink slippers are comfy :D) as well as the greeters who uses toothpicks to keep that perky look in his/her eyes, down to the L.A. style traffic and road hazards (yet to see a burning van in wal-mart (STEREOTYPE MUHAHA)) within the isles every time I visit a *-mart after 0:dark30. And my assumption was that this is the off-time and this is just what you deal with at night in the GIANT chain store.

Truth to the matter is they are ALWAYS this way. I asked a store Manager why they feel making a store harder to navigate and leaving you with an uncomfortable sense of being trapped between 4,000 lbs of products and motor oil is acceptable when clearly it creates an inconvenience to the customers they are providing the products for. He replied with, “You would need to contact our corporate center to obtain further information on our stocking procedures.” Clearly he had no friggin idea and agreed with me inside ;).

Anyway, if you read this far thank you for giving me brief control over your mind. More importantly this is a blog… any of you that are complaining about Steve’s original statement apparently own a fine dress set of NASCAR t-shirts as well as an acetated color collection of the Wal-mart 3.99 fuzzy slippers.

What a bunch of morally superior, overly judgmental, anti-capitalist (read: Marxist) tripe. All of you people who don’t like Wal-Mart, don’t shop there.

Not that every Wal-Mart is perfect, but this article and the reactions to it are all based in over generalizations, overblown rhetoric and hyperbole, and faux intellectualism. It practically reeks of condescension. Glad it’s merely an opinion piece, because if this were being called out as fact, I’d have busted a gut laughing at this nonsense by now. Get off your high horses, people.

As a former Target employee, I can tell you that Target Corp. doesn’t give better pay/benefits than Wal-Mart (at least not for the non-management employees). However, there are a few reasons (at least I think I can go into them briefly without giving away “Brand secrets” or otherwise getting slapped with a lawsuit from Target.) that there is such a night and day contrast between the two retail stores.

Don’t get me wrong. Yes they are both retail, and yes they both usually sell similar/comparable items for fairly competative prices. The main reason for the price difference (and no I haven’t been brainwashed LOL) is that Target usually has better quality items so you do get what you pay for.

Aside from that, Target tries to put forth an effort to at least listen to their employees and give them the tools they need to get the job done. Also Target seems to be a stepping stone for those who are going for buisness management. You should take a look at the people assisting you when you go to Target. Odds are unless they are past the average college student age, they will not be there in about a year and a half to two years, and that is mainly because said employees move on to something with opportunities in their chosen career field. Makes sense huh?

Now Target also has something Wal-mart doesn’t. Down time. Target closes usually at 10 pm (I know it varies regionally whether or not they close early on Sundays, etc as well as the holiday schedule) which allows team members to clean, restock, and finish duties without having to neglect customers. Since I now work night shift, I can’t tell you how many times I run in to Wal-mart (since Target closes about the time I am heading towards work) and need to get one or two things only to be nearly killed because someone has stacked fifteen palletes worth of merchandise haphazardly in a main aisle and then stares at you when you nearly get crushed by the falling merchandise and have to restack it so that others dont fall to the fate that nearly got you! *shakes head*

Now, the bathrooms in Target get just as nasty as Wal-Mart (trust me I have had to clean them…*shudders*) BUT there is a cleaning schedule of every two hours if someone is free on the floor, they are to check and clean the restrooms. Wal-mart supposedly has a similar system BUT I have yet to see anyone doing that job…….

At any rate, yes both are retail stores and can do positive/negative things to the local economy, but for the most part there are some major differences between the stores, and they all come down to the merchandise and the people.

I gotta agree with Nick that you are WAY off on the points. Me I like both Target and Walmart. I shop at both. I hold no discrimination towards either.

1) I agree with Nick that just giving a figure doesn’t mean squat. Wal-mart may have a more strict policy against criminals than Target. Target might let more of their shoplifters go. You can’t tell just by a number alone. As for the Hijacker’s buying the box cutters at walmart. Would it have been different or even mentioned if they had bought it at Target?

2) Walmart goes and builds anywhere they can. Target doesn’t care about tiny towns because they would rather put 1 or 2 in larger towns only. Also I’ve never seen any one poorly dressed in crappt clothes in either store actually. Also WalMarts prices are usually lower than Targets AND Target will not ad match. Walmart has target beat in that little area.

3) I think employees vary from store to store. I’ve had bad service at targets too in the past. To simply base it on a few experiences at a few stores and pass judgement on all is kind of cheap.

4) Again I see people angry at Target and see people happy at Wal-mart. Again it is a pointless anequedote.

5) I find both stores to be equally clean actually.

6) Only 1 Walmart in my area has the angled parking spaces. And I prefer that type. Easier to get in and out of.

7) Wal-Mart (The track aisle that runs around the store) aisles are larger than Target. Target doesn’t do Aisle features like Toys R Us and Wal-Mart. That is why it appears they are wider.

8) A lot of stores have no camera/picture taking policies.

9) I found Wal-Marts to be well organized too.

Basically people see Wal-Mart as evil for some reason. I honestly don’t see it.

I used to work for Wal-Mart as a 3rd shift stock person for a summer break from college. It was the best job I had had. I was paid better and treated better than at any other store. Call it evil all you want. Say the workers are treated horribly. I was NEVER treated poorly. I had worked for TRU and was paid about $6/hr, was only hired part time, was getting about 12hrs a week average, got 1/2 hr lunch, and if i was very lucky a 15 min break. At Walmart I was hired full time, got a full hour for lunch, two mandatory 15 min breaks, was paid a full dollar more base salary and since I was 3rd shift I got an extra dollar on top of that. I made enough that summer to pay my tuition, buy a new computer and pay for my books.

People say “oh how can those poor employees survive on that wage at Wal-Mart” Well it is a lot worse at other stores and I don’t hear people complain about them. All it is people think because a company is big it is evil. Ooooh scarey..

Good article – this is something that’s fodder for lunch-time discussion where I work. Our consensus is that Wal-Mart turns the efficency/optimization crank a turn or two too tight. Wal-Mart focuses on only one goal: lowest price for the consumer. It optimizes everything else to achieve that goal. Narrow aisles, dirty restrooms and crowded parking lots all shave a few pennies from prices.

Target doesn’t have a “soul” – it’s a corporation – but it does realize that low prices aren’t the only goal of the discount shopper. Sometimes shoppers need to pee, and sometimes they need to pass each other in the aisle. They see shoppers as more than uni-dimensional price optimization units.

As an fellow computer geek (software developer), I use the Wal-Mart example in my work. Whenever I get too focused on optimizing for one goal, I try to back off an see whether I’m Wal-Marting my application. Am I making the one thing I’m optimizing so very shiny that I’m forgetting how it fits into the big picture? If so, I know that I’m doing something that users probably won’t appreciate and might actually resent.

I think you are an idiot and you obviously have something against Walmart. You don’t make a valid point the whole time in your ramblings. As you strive to discredit and spout lazy witticisms about Walmart, you dig yourself so deep into a hole of doubt that no one will put any stock in anything you write. I believe that my 12 year old daughter can write an article with more insight and intelligence in one sentence than you could hope for in writing a whole book of so-called facts about Walmart. I pray for the future of this country’s reporters and writers, seeing as how you are a representative sample of what poor writing skill can do to freedom of speech.

I agree that Target is better. I have been to the local Wal-Mart in TC, MI several times, and have finally given up on bothering to go there. The employees are rude (though I can’t blame them fully–their job is terrible), products usually don’t appear to be in a logical order, it’s always overcrowded in cramped space, and the more seedy persons of town are constantly there. I remember one particular occasion where I saw an employee stocking things in the bedding section, so I asked (thinking that maybe they were part of the warehouse/stocking team) if they worked in that department.. the woman bit off my head lecturing me about how she wouldn’t be standing in there if she didn’t work in the department. I promptly left and have never returned since.

Our Target has pleasant and willing to help employees (even though their job isn’t the best either), is always clean and organized, and even though it’s inside a mall and therefore receives a lot of customers, you never feel overcrowded by people.

Now whenever my family send the kids Wal-Mart gift cards, I just use them on their website so that I don’t have to enter that store.

There’s nothing in this article I don’t agree with completely. I have each within about five or so minutes of my house and I absolutely refuse to go to Wal-Mart anymore. I just will not under any circumstances. Everytime I go there I get irritable and annoyed and then wind up feeling like I need a shower (as you stated) when I leave.

I’ve always said I hate shopping at Wal-Mart not for political reasons (although there are some pretty valid ones), but because I hate the feeling of needing a shower after I get out of there. I’m especially sensitive to it I guess because I grew up in white trash neighborhoods and left them behind– without regret– for a reason. Also, your comment on how hard it is to keep a positive attitude toward life in a Wal-Mart is spot on. Nice to see thee are more across the country who have the same observations.

I will no longer be going to any Walmart due to their support of NAIS (NAtional Animal Identification System) which will, if not stopped, no longer allow me to have horses! Sound crazy? An urban legend? Conspiracy theory. I only wish it were. For those who do not own animals, NAIS will also mean higher meat prices with lower quality and not knowing the origin of the meat. (, S. America? Mexico? China? Is it really beef?)

Under the lies of protecting the health of the national herd, keeping avian flu and mad cow disease at bay, NAIS is nothing more than a way to control (or completely put out of business) the little farmer or homesteader while benefitting the big megafarms (Tyson chicken, Cargill beef, Monsanto)who will have monopolies.

Even those who own one chicken, potbelly pig or pony will have to

1. register their premises like sex offenders and child molesters have to do (and pay yearly fees in some states with no guarantee it will not go up and up)

2. animal identification- all livestock must be micro chipped ($400-$500 for scanner and cost of chips cost whcih can be easily tampered with) The big megafarms will not have to microchip every critter, they just get lot numbers.

3. animal tracking–all animal births, deaths and off property movements must be reported within 24 hours or face huge fines. (The big megafarms will not have to file reports!)

Sound like fun? And of course, there will be fees with filing. When will you ever get time to ride that horse or milk that cow?

Here is some better news on how this program will protect us from animal disease. If disease is even suspected in a 6 mile radius area all livestock can be depopulated. (See the Henshaw story at nonais.org. They were held hostage for 10 days by the USDA while all their livestock were killed, though none were tested!)

NAIS is the creation of USDA/APHIS/NIAA, the latter of which is a consortium of mega-agribusinesses who began planning this system before 1996. It had nothing to do with BSE and has nothing to do with disease management. It was conceived by the likes of Tyson, Cargill, Monsanto, National Pork Producers, etc. with the sole purpose of gaining, expanding and ensuring the foreign meat export business.

I Personnally Love Walmart. There are 4 walmarts within 15 minutes of my house, and i think only 2 targets. The main reason is because so all those people who you speak of wearing those Nascar shirts don’t have to go to my target while I’m there.

I agree completely about Wal-Mart; in fact, I’ve nicknamed it “Itchy Scratchy” cuz that’s how I feel when I leave there. The worst time to go is very late at night…that’s when the parents-of-the-year come out in droves with their children, screeching at them to stop their whining, because they don’t get that maybe the kids just wanna be home sleeping because it’s 11 p.m., not out with mom getting jumbo rolls of Bounty

Walmart focuses solely on being the low-cost leader which is a valid business plan for those of us who need the lowest price possible. Customer service, store cleanliness etc are included in the policy but left to the control of the store manager (good manager = good store)

Target positions itself as better than Walmart and focuses most on customer service. Price is less of a factor, obviously. There’s not much left to the control of the store manager except employee relations (bad manager = miserable employees)

The employees are not different, in fact many of them may interchange between the stores. At Target (I’m ex-Target) the orders were be overly attentive to the “guests” (no matter how rude, and believe me, Target “guests” can be major a$$holes) or be disciplined/fired. My friends who went to work at Walmart were much happier because they didn’t have such a rigid customer service policy and the customers were generally more polite.

I have an RV, and have stayed overnight many times at various Wal-Marts. It really becomes a party late at night! We all come out and start drinking and partying. If there are any homeless guys wandering around, we offer them a bottle if they will fight each other, similar to “Bum Fights”. I remember some great fights! In the morning, we see how badly we have trashed the parking lot, but we just leave. Wal-Mart is a good place for travelers.

I do agree that Target is way better than Wal-Mart. My comment is actually aimed at Adrian. My family likes to watch Nascar, and we are not trailer park trash. My husband has a degree, and I have computer certifications. By the way UM, last time I checked racing is spelled this way and not raceing!!!!

Spot on. I live in a town outside of Cincinnati where we have a target (that I love!) and we fought repeatedly against having a super Walmart built. They used their financial leverage and are now building across the street from Target. Walmarts are consistantly the source of traffic nightmares. They draw a wide variety of shoppers. And have you ever stopped at a walmart after most stores are closed? Very few shoppers speak english, many threaten and abuse overly tired (should have been in bed hours ago) children. The lights and craziness annoy the poor folks unlucky enough to have invested in a home long before walmart infested their neighborhood.

I’ve visited Walmarts and Targets in at least 7 different states, several locales per state (I camp a lot and that means I leave odds and ends out on occasion) and I have noticed most of the same observations that you have. I currently live in a college town so the state our our Walmart is unusually dismal and scary, but for some reason it doesn’t carry over to the Target which is located one strip mall installation away from said Walmart. Our target is bright and pleasant with nice college kids that are helpful and upbeat.
That said, I’m liking your blog and this was done in a very cute tongue-in-cheek way.

I shop at Walmart as much as I shop at Target…Kmart closed in my town.

The reality is after Sam Walton died, Walmart developed cancer and started spreading at an uncontrollable rate…

Of course you realize that “We The People” created and sustain all of those large bloated stores. Why? Because we are more interested in saving a few cents than the overall good. Walmart isn’t evil…we are…we are selfish, and childish.

If you don’t want Walmart to survive, then go to your local mom and pop stores with limited/outdated items, and buy them at the sometimes twice the price of the Walmarts.

…for example a nice little corner store in Little Italy Chicago…a small box of corn flakes for 5 bucks…compared to a giant box for less money at the super stores…

I’m a Target shopper. We’re a military family and Walmarts are prevalent in a lot of communities surrounding military bases. My husband and I even witnessed a wedding in a Walmart in Florida. Uber-tacky. I don’t shop at Walmart unless there is no choice — like in some of the single-seat towns where military bases seem to end up. I thought the comment about the smell of stale popcorn and failure was on target, no pun intended.

Angled one way rows might be safer IF walmarts customers were smart enough to go the RIGHT WAY in them.

All these walmart lovers are cracking me up. Either they work there or they are mad you put down their beloved nascar.

I have not been in a walmart for over 6 months now and I dont miss it at all.

Can anyone explain why you get blasted with the stench of 10,000 farts when the automatic doors open? Does walmart have some sort of ventilation system that collects the farts and forces them to the front of the store to be vented when the doors open? I think this is the major cause of the sick feeling you get when you walk in the door.

While I do think that your comments about the clientele at Walmart were a little mean-spirited, I agree overall and wholeheartedly with the idea of your article. (I know people who shop at Walmart rather than Target because that’s what their budgets require.) It’s nice to know that I’m not alone in my distaste for Walmart.

They built a Walmart across the street from my house 5 years ago. What a nightmare! The employees are rude and treat you like an annoyance. Quite often they are out of whatever it is that I want. They have pallets of stock blocking every conceiveable aisle so you can’t get from one department to another. (Which makes me question, why I can never find what I’m looking for.)

I do not shop at that Walmart or any other in the Mid-Atlantic region. (I have been in stores in North Carolina and it’s a different world. It’s almost like the commercials!)
I would rather drive 25 minutes to the nearest Target or Kmart.

But don’t bash the people who HAVE to shop there. I’m sure they’d rather go to Target if they could.

Funny article, Steve, and more than a grain of truth. But don’t you folks find it more than a little sad that WHERE YOU SHOP IS RESPONSIBLE FOR HOW YOU FEEL? I mean, if that’s not a statement on the emptiness of a consumer-dominated culture, I don’t know what is…
You idiots are validating Karl Marx with every empty message; just replace “religion” with “shopping” and you’ve boldy illuminated the REAL opiate of the masses…

Amen! Your comments articulate my experiences as well. I wasn’t suprised to learn that Target is (or was originally) a subsidiary of the Hudson Bay Company, which I think accounts for their quality/class. I will add that Super WalMart saved my ass last Saturday night when I needed Liquid Glass to repair a blown head gasket: no one else was open.

I must be lucky, cause the Walmart where I live is slightly better than the Targets in my area.

The cashiers at my local Target, both in Madison, TN and Hendersonvile, Tn, are rude/indifferent, but I LOVE the cashiers at our local (Hendersonville) Walmart.

Parking lots are pretty much the same at both of them, but our Target is the culprit in narrow aisles, whereas Walmart tends to have wider ones.

I think its subjective to where you live, in our area of TN the Walmarts are on par with Target, but go 20 miles south of here, and both of them are nasty/filthy places.

I’d probably shop at either one, Target for the “nicer things” like photo albums and home decor, and stick to Wal-Mart for groceries, and non-edited films/cds (There is something VERY wrong with editing, I agree with that, maybe that should have been on the top 10, it applies to all of the Wal-mart stores, whereas parking lots, aisle size and cleanliness only pertain to a few)

This article was at least thought provoking, judging by the amount of comments its received. Its not really humorous, but you’ve got people talking!

Agreed on all points – I’ve said this numerous times on my blog as well.

I’d like to add one more: #11: Target is peaceful, Walmart is anything but.

I walk out of walmart wanting to blow the place up, I hate everything about it, large part is the aural atmosphere. They scream everything overhead on intercom. Target uses walkies.

When in Walmart I am inundated with noise. I know who is late on thier break (by the number of times, with increasing anger in thier pager’s voice) what department is on break and not answering pages, who is getting tracked where by wat cameras, calls for cashiers to come up front… It’s all enoughto make this former retail moneky want to go get a gun off the shelves and go hunting in the store.

In Target, it’s quiet, peaceful and I lose track of time, They do all thier business on walkies and it’s not in your face or ears, the most I usually hear is a conversation between customers, or a baby cranking (though most babays are reamarkably good in taget, prolly for #11) , maybe the music from the TVs in the elcetronics department. They also never play holiday music or commericals for itself or it’s products overhead.

It’s just relaxing to go to Target.it’s a good shopping environment.

AND THAT is what Walmart doesn’t get. Shopping doens’t have to be an assualt on your senses. People will buy more if left alone to enjoy the process of shopping itself.

I live 65 miles from any Target store-I live 15 miles from Walmart. It’s not like I have a choice (and no, I’m not moving back) I would just like to see some competition, whether it is Target, Kmart, Fred Meyer, etc. I would also like to have Walmart employees spend a couple of weeks doing nothing else but stocking the shelves. Then maybe they’ll have a general idea of where something is located. To all Walmart employees: If you don’t know where something is, either tell me you don’t know or ask someone who does.

My soul dies on the rarest of occasions I find myself having to go into Wal-Mart. Target feels like a department store as designed by Andy Warhol, always contemporary and stylish. Thanks for summarizing what I’ve always felt.

You forgot poor item quality at Walmart. The item may be a full $0.07 cheaper than Target’s, but I’ll guarantee you you’ll end up replacing it sooner. Even name brand (and good name brand) products, particularly electronics and appliances seem to fall apart disturbingly quickly. It’s uncanny. Futon, DVD player, toaster oven, clothing and more – all replaced long before their times.

Walmart free since November ’02 – and that was just because my bank branch was inside and open Sundays, until I got sick of going there even for just that reason. I can’t remember the last time I actually bought something there.

Well said. Walmart’s business practices are and should be an example of what is killing America. Remember a few years back when Walmart’s slogan was “Made in America”? Yeah, neither do they.

Go into any Walmart and pick up the first ten items in any aisle. I’m being completely serious here. How many of those items are made in America? The last time I tried it I was in the kids clothing section. It took me over 30 items before I found 1 made in the US. Most were Chinese, some from India, the rest were from Central America.

Point is, Walmart kills domestic industries with their business practices. There was a great article in a business mag a few years back describing how they basically extorted a domestic bicycle manufacturer to reduce their price (despite the fact that materials and manpower cost more each year) or Walmart would simply buy the same bike (counterfeited like all their crap) from China. Walmart is the world’s largest retailer and so businesses get the all or nothing demand from them…sell only to us or you don’t sell anything here at all.

It’s disgusting and if it were a Chinese owned company doing it, it would have been boycotted long ago.

I haven’t personally shopped at a Walmart in well over 2 years. I’m not normally the consumer activist type…but this company requires action.

Target is far and away the better store, although I have to say that of the 2 nearest my home there is one that is just as grungy and ill managed as any Walmart I have visited. I think there are areas where the clientele have no problem picking through merchandise and throwing it on the floor, which is just a reflection of the lack of courtesy in general that seems to prevail these days. In fact I visited a VERY upscale Macys a while back, where there were 3 different people with dogs in the store. When I asked a sales clerk why that was allowed, she told me that the customers in this area were rich, and Macy’s management let’s them get away with all kinds of crap like that. This saleswomen told me that she had to pick up poop from the dressing rooms! As if that weren’t bad enough, when I visited the restroom in the same store, there was a woman in the next stall chatting on her cellphone while peeing. She flushed and walked out (without washing her hands…) all the while carrying on this conversation about NOTHING. People can be pigs or angels no matter where you shop.

Wal-Mart is the largest employer in the world. People talk about how it crushes rural communities, but for ever job walmart elminates, it creates 30. Walmart-Target, its all the same, just packaged different.

“Wal-Mart (The track aisle that runs around the store) aisles are larger than Target. Target doesn’t do Aisle features like Toys R Us and Wal-Mart. That is why it appears they are wider.”

They don’t just APPEAR wider, if you put a bunch of crap in an aisle, it ACTUALLY becomes more narrow, because there is less usable space. “Aisle features” not only make the aisle more narrow and harder to navigate just by the space they they consume, but they also encourage people to stop, with their cart and children taking up most of the width of a crowded aisle (a space that should be devoted entirely to MOVING) and look at the stupid 99 cent crap being promoted, with little regard for the growing crowd behind them full of angry people trying to get by them and on with their life. Trying to utilize every square foot of floor space at the expense of customers’ ease of getting around the store with minimal frustration is classic Wal*Mart BS.

Also, don’t forget that Target stores tend to have landscaping in the parking lots (trees, shrubbery, etc). Wal-Mart treats the parking lot as a hot slab of enduring and inescapable plant-life sterility, leaving their customers only with a brutal exposure to the elements as the first experience upon visiting a store.

Trees, people, they provide shade, and they make giant parking lots look more like parks and less like construction zones!

One reason WM employees are so unhappy and inattentive is that the majority of them are treated like half-witted fools by the management. When people get treated like this day after day, it does affect their attitudes toward customers. Also, a lot of WM customers are extreme a**holes. They want everything NOW! If a department does not have what is wanted/needed, then, BY GOD!, someone’s gonna pay. ( I worked for WM 3 months and would never do it again, even if I were living on the streets!)

I’ll have to find a Target with nice employees. They surely don’t exist here in NC. I’ve been run over by a few…with carts, yes. (I’m hard to miss, too.)

I am a vendor for various stores (Target and Wal-Mart included), and the difference between the two is REMARKABLE. Target has an excellent system for replenishing stock and organizing inventory. Out of over a dozen Wal-Marts, I can tell you that if they have a system, nobody sticks to it. Boxes are piled up anywhere, pallets jam the aisles, and shopping carts full of crap are left everywhere, sometimes even blocking fire exits.

I work with Wal-Mart managers and employees, and while some take pride in their work, more often than not I am a dumping ground for complaints against other employees, higher ups, and the Wal-Mart company in general. At Target I have never had such an experience, in fact the employees I work with at Target do take pride in their work, even when it comes to stocking shelves. I like that!

I have stopped shopping at Wal-Mart entirely. Their unfair labor practices, their use of slaves to make their items (yes, slaves, do a google search for “Wal-Mart Slaves” and you’ll find out about the conditions of the slave camps in China used to make Wal-Mart products, for those who need sources) and the fact that their prices really aren’t that much lower have driven me straight to Target and K-mart.

Their narrow aisles, overstocked shelves, unhelpful employees (many of them really do seem to have had the life drained out of them, I pity them so this isn’t a slam on them) and their loooong checkout lines just plain suck.

Thank you for your observations – more of us need to be outspoken about the plague of Wal-Marts blighting the land like a cancer.

Wal Mart here in the Southern rural town I live in…hmm. We used to have cool hardware stores, mom and pop ones where the folks knew you and all that has basically went to pot. No more small town grocery where you could watch them cut your meat and pick just the right piece. I hate Wal Mart. I tried to find a redeeming quality. One of the young folks that work there is a friend of mine and the employees constantly live in fear, due to the sixth manager in 2 months being still a tyrant.

I do like Dollar General. Small, to the point, economical. I only go into Wal Mart when I have to. My wife swears it has an effect on me because as soon as I walk into WM, I get nervy and want to go stand at my vehicle.

I have learned that you do NOT ask anyone at Wal Mart in rural MS a technical question. When I worked in hardware, the FIRST thing I had to do was learn every item in the store, then I learned to make keys and THEN I had to prove I could do a bid on a house before I got my raise. I always helped my customers, even the difficult ones.

I asked a store clerk at Wal Mart once if they had a specialty tool – a hole saw. That is a simple common hardware item. She looked at me like a Martian at a donut. Don’t ask for help at Wal Mart. Its too much for the workers to handle.

I thought it was only me. I just get depressed and nauseous after five minutes in a Wal-Mart. I think the argument that Wal-Mart is evil is kinda weak; they’re just a business like any other. Some of their business decisions are questionable, but legal. But the argument that Wal-Mart is depressing is spot-on.

The ONE THING I found to be great about Wal-Mart is their automatic automotive battery console, where you can drill down through every type of car or motorcycle and it will quickly tell you which type of battery you need. I actually went in there looking for a battery for a 1972 motorcycle and the machine told me exactly what I needed.

Of course, that was after I asked six employees to help me and got no assistance – they couldn’t even figure out how to use the machine. I taught the one guy how it works after I figured it out myself. On the other hand, the machine probably replaces a highly skilled employee who would have to learn how to look up a battery in a book.

Additionally, I find that the stuff I have bought there tend to fall apart and break more quickly than I expect them too. I bought an alarm clock there and the next morning smashed it to pieces with nothing more than a typically morning snooze-smacking.

One of the points I repeatedly see people making against Steve’s observations is the fact that his experiences, as related in his post, are isolated to a single Wal-Mart. My life has taken me all over the American South through the past 12 years, and I must say, over a wide variety of experiences in Wal-Marts, including the original Wal*Mart in Bentonville, AR, I have come to feel about Wal-Mart the same grievances that Steve relates. In fact, I have come to refer to the place as “The Big, Lazy Lot.” This, of course, is intentionally ironic; draw your own conclusions based on your experiences, but the nickname originated out of every Wal-Mart I have visited always having the most atrocious, cluttered, littered parking lots I have ever seen. And I have obsereved this in four different states and in at least ten different cities. Shopping carts seem to be a particular problem. Often, one has to park a veritable mile from the entrance due to nearer spaces being filled with carts dumped by lazy customers. I actually once had a lady (I used the term lightly) place her cart directly behind my automobile even as she saw me unlocking the door to get in. Of course, this is not a Wal-Mart problem, as such, but one of the kind of clients it attracts.

And there will be naysayers at this point who will wish to tell me that I, too, am one of those clients, so what right do I have to complain? Well, it is a simple fact that, I am, apparently, one of the rare breed who returns his shopping cart … even when I have to walk great distances to reach the cart returns. Indeed, part of the problem is a lack of cart returns on the lot (my guess being cart returns take up valuable customer/consumer/potential spender space) … and, people being a lazy lot (again, the irony) tend to decide that it is far too great a distance to walk given that Wal-Mart is supposed to have employees to retrieve the carts.

I could, but will not, go into the many and varied experiences I have had with employees, but I shall limit my diatribe to the top three in my memory. One involved a cashier’s planning with a customer she apparently knew to partake in illegal drug use after work; she had no qualms about speaking about this openly as I waited, next in line. Another involved asking an emplyee in the hardware if she knew where something was located (I have since forgotten what it was), and she responded, literally, by yelling at me that it was “NOT MY DEPARTMENT, NOT MY PROBLEM.” I actually told a manager about tthe incident. The manager politely told me … “Oh, that’s just how she is.”

I of course felt immediately satiated. That same shopping venture, at the check out, the cashier scowled at my approach, huffed audibly, and exclaimed, “My day ain’t never going end.” I tried to smile at her, but she refused to look at me during the transaction.

But my favorite employee memory of all time is thus. Upon entering one fine afternoon my local Wal-Mart, I noticed several female employees leaving their shifts. They were all talking extremely loudly and were particularly hard to miss as they were all particularly overweight (and so am I, therefore I can comment on it with vindication). The largest of the big, lazy lot, who weighed somehwere, in my estimation, over three hundred fifty pounds, was heard to exclaim … “I been on my feets all damn day. I ain’t walking all that way to my car.” She then proceeded to stuff herself into one of the stores electric wheelchairs … and drove herself out of the store.

Yes, I am sure that my limited experience is not proof final that Wal-Mart is evil, etc. Yes, I realize that my experiences have been unique. But they have also been pervasiveand in a variety of locations.

Why do I shop there? Because I can get the work-a-day items I need at a cheap price. I don’t make much money, and, unfortunately, I do have to bargain shop. I shop outside of Wal-Mart as often as I can, using another place for pharmacuticals, and saving high-dollar purchases for more respectable places. Mom and pop places.

I agree 100%! The Walmart near my house has a lawsuit against it right now because of the guy who got super glued to a toilet seat.

And just a small FYI:
“For just the 551 stores sampled, there were 2,909 reported police calls for “violent or serious crimes,” including 4 homicides, 9 rapes or attempts, 23 kidnappings or attempts, 154 sex crimes, 550 robberies or attempts and 1,024 auto thefts”http://www.wakeupwalmart.com/press/20060502.html

Actually, BP, I buy plinking ammunition at Walmart, all my premium self-defense stuff comes from Sportsmans Warehouse. Why is it you feel that the only reason to own a gun is my (non-existant) desire to kill people. I was using ammunition as an example of how Walmart caters to a wider customer base. I live closer to Target than Walmart. Walmart carries more of what I want, therefore they get my business.
Almost everyone who has posted here has generalized and stereotyped both Walmart and Target customers. I see virtually no difference in clientel. Who could be so bold as to make the statement that Target customers are all happy and clean (paraphrasing), while Walmart customers are scum of the earth.
Why are people here opposed to big business? I don’t agree with all of Walmarts practices, but what they do is not wrong. Nobody is being forced to work or shop at Walmart. The fact that people do work and shop there voluntarily should tell you something: people like it.

I agree with you 100 percent!!! I’ve been saying the exact same things about Wal-Mart for a long time now. I sometimes do have to go there for one thing or another, but believe me, I dread when I have to. Case in point, I went there the other day because I was in the area and I was tired and wanted to go home. I immediately regretted this when I entered the store (I do agree about the parking lots though). As soon as a grabbed a cart, which was sticky and gross, I felt sick to my stomach! The floors are always dirty and sticky, it’s loud and obnoxious in there, and you just feel dumber for having walked in. I think that Wal-Mart is a nasty sore on the face of our country. I LOVE Target!!! It is just like night and day. I was at Target today and grabbed a nice, clean cart with wheels that don’t squeak and pull to the right or left. I found exactly what I was looking for without any problems, the deals are great, the selection is great, and the service is great. Shopping at Target is just a far more superior experience for me. I will never not shop at Target! Way to go Steve for voicing what is on the mind of many consumers!

I try to avoid both target and walmart if I can. I’d say my favorite national store is walgreens. Targets are always so dimly lit, it kind of drives me nuts when I’m in there. Walgreens always seems to be a positive place to be and is always a great place to find christmas gifts. (I don’t get ALL my christmas gifts there).
But I do agree that walmart sucks.

As far as the police calls go, I went to the site and read some of the calls that had been issued at the closest store that was listed (there were two that are closer, but not listed). The vast majority of the calls were for misdemeanor theft, or felony check forgery. Shoplifting and passing bad checks. Not exactly violent crimes.

[…] The Target Store post has become popular beyond my wildest dreams, so I wanted to tell you why I did it. I felt I needed to tell you what I learned about myself – I feel good at Target Stores and rotten at Wal-Mart. I didn’t intend for it to be a scientific study. I took it as a personal opportunity to share my inner world with you. […]

I live in Ontario and the Walmart near me actually makes me ill. I can’t pin point why! Is it the lighting? Is it the air? Is it negative ions? Who the heck knows. All I know is, no other store of any kind makes me physically ill. This store actually gives me anxiety attacks! What’s with that! We don’t have Target here in Canada (as far as I know) but I sure wish we did! I avoid walmart at all costs. It just isn’t worth it.

For some strange reason, every time I go to Wal Mart I feel an immense and rather urgent need to poo. I tend to avoid the (w)hole ordeal. However, despite never having been to a Target, it is on my list of things to do….even if the closest one is in Buffalo. I can drool at the online selection, but alas, I cannot buy. They don’t do Canada! I feel teased.

What part of Wal-Mart’s behavior is American? Is it the near slave labor that they actively encourage to manufacture their goods? Yes, slavery is so American. Is Wal-Mart concerned with their customer’s safety? You have to love trying to maneuver a cart around the pallets of junk they leave in the middle of all the aisles (hello, where’s the fire marshal)? Or, how about eliminating hand baskets to discourage “quick” runs in to grab a couple things? How about the practice of moving product around so that you have to search for it and in turn, find more things to buy? If those are the things that make Wal-Mart “American” then by god, it’s certainly one of the most American companies out there!! Quick to do ANYTHING to make a buck. Be it at the mercy of cities of Chinese people, the obstructing of exit routes in case of emergencies, and the underhanded sneakiness of creating higher sales to line the pockets of their corporate goons.

If Wal-Marts practices can be defined as American, I can honestly say, I’m not proud. I thoroughly enjoyed the article above but it’s “fluffy”. It’s all opinion and not a lot of substantiated fact. Trust me, I completely agree 110%. I would much rather shop at Target. I got the same creepy hopeless feeling the whole TWO times I’ve entered the den of Satan and I will never again go near it. Traffic worsens within two blocks of a Wal-Mart and the parking lots are awful. They are narrow with horrible line of sight, and let’s face it, those people that routinely shop at Wal-Mart are probably very distracted by yelling at their kids to really watch where they are backing up.

Wal-Mart is out to make money at the expense of America, China and everyone else who has the misfortune to be touched by this conglomerate. Unfortunately, many American companies have adopted these practices since we Americans put a value on the bottom line. Wal-Mart is a very good example as to what happens when achieving the greatest amount of profit gets in the way with common sense, ethics and civic responsibility. America is in the midst of a nasty spiral that we, as shoppers, help to encourage by shopping in these places, or by buying the stock. We are all about convenience or finding the lowest cost. At what expense are we encouraging this behavior? What is happening to our small towns? Where did the uniqueness of each small town disappear to? Where are all of the mom-and-pop stores? Heck, where are places where everyone knows your name (stop me before I break out in a sitcom jingle).

Yes, there are many people that are low-income and cannot afford to shop elsewhere. They see a Wal-Mart and see it as a great place to go and get diapers and clothing cheaply for their kids. Again, it’s a nasty cycle. They spend a little bit of money for poor quality items that will need replacing much faster than something bought at a different store. And what gets sold, gets replaced with more equally poor quality stuff.

A potential way to help improve the situation is to fairly pay the staff. Minimum wage or barely above isn’t helping anyone. It’s keeping them in the rut, unable to save or work towards elevating themselves above where they are. Sure, there’s probably plenty of people that are fine with where they are in life, but with the term “American Dream” bandied about, I’d say, not likely.

Another option is to NOT SHOP THERE!!! There are plenty of you that use the excuse of “It’s the only store that’s open when I’m off work/going to work.” Is it possible that maybe you could shop somewhere else on your days off? And when you do get the chance to run errands during the day, how about shopping at smaller, locally owned stores? Stores where you can actually meet or see the owner working the floor, chatting with customers or helping out. A store that has familiar faces and that you can actually make a connection with have got to be infinitely better than having to be “greeted” by scowling employees who aren’t happy to be there.

Sure, not all Wal-Marts are created equal. Some sound almost pleasant to visit. But they all belong to the same big bad corporate giant who pays their board members millions while paying the lowly help mere pennies. Is that what you really want to support? I don’t.

Did I not give any good reasons to not shop there? That’s ok, go online and google “Hate Wal-Mart” and find some for yourself, there’s more than enough.